Marco Pierre White - a very scary man?

Marco Pierre White and the Undertaker, two scary looking men with eyes that could kill...

This week the nation's tv schedules have been dominated by cooking related programmes, we've had BBC2s Kitchen Criminals in which the likeable top chef John Burton Race has been trying to make decent cooks out of people who hitherto couldn't boil an egg. It has been interesting, if not riveting tv so far.

We've also been subjected to another reality tv cooking show on BBC2 The Restaurant. Raymond Blanc and his top team of restauranteur empolyees are the judges in a competition in which couples are pitted against each other to win their own restaurant and in doing so they will become business partners with the top French chef.

The Restaurant's format is slightly different from other similar realilty tv shows of the cooking genre, in that Blanc and his top team really do test all aspects of the competing couples skill-sets. Everything from restaurant management, marketing, budgeting and cooking is tested thoroughly and quite entertaining The Restaurant has been too.

In last night's episode the extremely annoying Jacqui and Sam were thankfully turfed off, largely because of their appalling grasp of the numbers.

While The Restaurant has the makings of a decent pot-boiler, ITVs Hells Kitchen has been grabbing all the headlines, not least because there's a new head chef in the rather scary form of Michelin star chef Marco Pierre White.

Hells Kitchen's former head chef Gordon Ramsay, was apparently once reduced to tears by White. However, Marco says he didn't force Gordon to cry, 'it was Gordon's decision to cry'...

Ramsay has a somewhat confrontational management style in his tv shows, he's all too often foul-mouthed, often when shouting down his subordinates within his 'brigade'.

Marco Pierre White has an altogether different management style in the kitchen and while he has sinister looks that could curdle fresh milk and send your blood cold in the blink of an eye. The contrast between White and Ramsay is marked.

Everyone in the Hells Kitchen apparently loves White. For this reason I've been wondering if the Hells Kitchen bosses might be encouraging Marco to turn on the frighteners in bid to get nasty in the remaining days of the competition.

White could easily stand in for the WWE's undertaker, he possess similar scary looks, but in this reality TV show he's something of a big pussy-cat.

Gordon Ramsay going soft?...

Viewers who tuned into Ramsay's latest 'F Word' offering on Channel 4 might well have been surprised to see Gordon show mercy when confronted with the decision to pull the trigger and shoot a beautiful wild Deer - thankfully Ramsay blinked when the awful moment arrived and instead of pulling the trigger Gordon showed his not often seen human side as he pulled back from the brink as he trudged away to reflect 'am I going ******* soft'?...

The show was pre-recorded and last week Channel 4 received many angry calls from viewers who were upset over the piece on horse meat when Janet Street-Porter was seen sending a beautiful Pony away for slaughter, but what happened this week was no knee-jerk PR reaction to the protests of the last episode when People For The Ethical Treatment Of Animals (PETA) criticised the show and Ramsay.

Indeed PETA will no doubt be in touch with Channel 4 again over another rather controversial piece in last nights show in which Geese were seen to be force fed in preparation for high quality foi gras (duck liver).

Ramsay is no doubt courting controversy but at least his F Word show is raising public awareness on such issues.

Special delivery for Gordon Ramsay's restaurant - 1 tonne of horse manure!

One lump or one tonne Gordon?

Here at Top TV Talk we knew that Janet Street-Porter's shocking film about sending a horse to slaughter for the dining room table on this weeks edition of the F Word would enrage the British public and so it has. It has quite literally caused a right old stink, because PETA (aka People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) have dumped a tonne of steaming horse dung on the doorstep of Gordon Ramsay's top London restaurant Claridge's.

Full Story...

Porter upsets horse lovers in Ramsay's F word...

Trigger happy Janet Street-Porter in ratings shocker...

It's not often that I'm shocked when watching the goggle box, but last night I was as Janet Street-Porter trundled off to France on Ramsay's F Word to send a nag to slaughter, just so she could taste horse meat. Unlike many animals which we Brits happily consume without too much thought or consideration, horses are owned and loved by many of us and what shocked me was that Porter went to the trouble of going off to France to capture one short clip of one our four legged friend's being ushered into the back of a horse box for slaughter in preparation for human consumption.

This short clip brought home the harsh reality of what happens in other parts of Europe where the practice is common, but thankfully not so in the UK. Added to which there is concerns for the horses welfare as many are transported very long distances on the way to slaughter in totally inadequate conditions, there was no mention of this during the F Word.

In the programme Ramsay and Porter conclude that eating horse meat is good for you because of its nutritional values, I guess that they also thought that in making this short film that too would be good for the F Word, but the move has been described elsewhere as a desperate attempt to drive up ratings.

I have to say it left me completely unimpressed and slightly puzzled and yes slightly shocked too. Unlike the rest of the tv chefs, Ramsay has managed to do something with his rather unique - for much of his many shows it isn't just about the food, that is almost incidental, it's all about him and his huge personality, and how many times Gordon can say **** in the allotted time. Maybe Gordon & co feel the expletives shock factor is wearing thin hence the search for new shock tactics. Great tv? I don't think so.